Network management platforms exist which permit a systems administrator to connect to a set of targets in a network, and perform maintenance and diagnostic activities on a variety of managed machines. The network management platform can identify individual targets via a machine hardware ID, security credential, or other means, and identify the software provisioning requirements, obtain a hardware inventory, or perform other management tasks on validated machines. In general, existing network management platforms can be hosted on a central server or other facility that permits connection to, identification, and management of the various sets of targets.
In terms of access to the various sets of targets, each set of targets can be managed via a management console, or control tool which interacts with underlying targets from a supervisory host or other level to access the underlying target machines. In implementations, the management console can provide a dashboard or other graphical view or interface to the resources of the underlying target. For example, the memory, storage, processor, and/or other resources of a target or targets can be exposed and controlled via the management console associated with the target or group of targets.
In different managed networks, the set of management consoles supporting different sets of targets and/or other machines can consist of different software packages, different versions of those software packages, different interfaces, and/or different security or access levels for users who invoke the various management consoles. In existing network implementations, the systems administrator or other user may have to manually recall which set of targets require which management console, and/or hop from terminal to terminal in order to locate or invoke the management console corresponding to a set of attached targets. Thus, there is a need in the art for methods and systems that provide centralized access to management console resources to interact with a set of underlying targets and/or other machines having a diverse set of connection ports and/or console assignments.